Carter v. Morris’s Empirical Analysis
164 F.3d 215 · 1999
Citation profile
18 federal appellate · 21 district · 5 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 128 later decisions — most recently June 2025 · most notably Kopec v. Tate (2004), Niese v. City of Alexandria (2002)
18 federal appellate · 21 district · 5 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on Monell v. Department of Social Services of City of New York · City of Canton v. Harris · Pembaur v. City of Cincinnati · Board of the County Commissioners of Bryan County v. Brown · Hill v. California
Most-quoted passages
The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 128 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“is so persistent and widespread and so permanent and well settled as to constitute a custom or usage with the force of law.”
12 later decisions quote this exact passage“[assuming arguendo [plaintiff] suffered a deprivation of her federal rights, it is by now well settled that a municipality is only liable under section 1983 if it causes such a deprivation through an official policy or custom. Municipal policy may be found in written ordinances and regulations, in certain affirmative decisions of individual policymaking officials, or in certain omissions on the part of policymaking officials that manifest deliberate indifference to the rights of citizens. Outside of such formal deci-sionmaking channels, a municipal custom may arise if a practice is so “persistent and widespread” and “so permanent and well settled as to constitute a ‘custom or usage’ with the force of law.””
3 later decisions quote this exact passage“[m]unicipal policy may be found in written ordinances and regulations, in certain affirmative decisions of individual policymaking officials, or in certain omissions on the part of policymaking officials that manifest deliberate indifference to the rights of citizens.”
3 later decisions quote this exact passage
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.